Rescued Research Beagles Experience Life Outside A Cage For The First Time

[Contrary1]

Surely, there must be another way to test product safety. It just breaks my heart. But I am happy that these sweethearts were rescued, and will live out their remaining days uncaged.

"One week ago, the Beagle Freedom Project rescued nine beagles from a research laboratory in Nevada. The beagles, which were bred to be test animals, have spent their entire lives in cages and have never experienced life outdoors. This is the moment the beagles feel grass on their paws and play in the sunlight for the first time in their lives."

[TDale313]

1. That made me cry...

Both sad and happy tears.

[nikto]

2. May they all find the loving homes these sweet doggies obviously deserve

[DesertDiamond]

3. TDale313, me too! My heart was bursting with joy and at the same time was aching for...

the suffering they've been through.

[barbtries]

4. damn that made me cry and cry

there should be a better way, but thank you to the people who make life possible for research beagles.

[MineralMan]

5. My wife and I have adopted one of these

lab beagles through the Beagle Freedom Project.

The Minnesota state legislature just passed a bill requiring labs that get state money to release the animals for adoption once the experimentation is over, rather than euthanizing them.

A contribution to the Beagle Freedom Project will help make this effort even more successful.

Here's Sam, our BFP rescue beagle, looking at the camera on the day he came to his forever home. Dude, the beagle basset mix is looking on. The gates came down two days later. This is from December of 2013. Today, I'm about to take them both out for their morning walk.

[A Brand New World]

7. That is wonderful!

n/t

[okaawhatever]

13. +100 nt

[A Brand New World]

6. I hope they can learn to trust humans.

Happy for them. Sad that this type of research still goes on.

[MineralMan]

8. They can. Our Sam, adopted through the Beagle Freedom Project

in December, 2013, just got back from his morning walk with our beagle/basset mix, Dude. Along the walk, both dogs were glad to see children who came out to pet them, and to greet other dogs on our route. Sam is opening up and becoming his own beagle more and more every day. My wife and I can see it happening.

It can be hard work, since most of these dogs are 2-3 years old when rescued from research labs, so they're starting over as real dogs. But, they're resilient and, with patience, they blossom.

[A Brand New World]

12. I'm glad to hear this.

We rescued a golden retriever 8 years ago who had been abused. She was 10 months old at the time. She still has issues with some circumstances, like being cornered in the bathroom with no means of escape, even though she is in no danger of being hit or hurt. Or being approached in the dark, especially if she's sleeping. Things like that. She doesn't react viciously but just rushes out or away and will knock you over if you're not careful. It's sad how they can carry that terror with them for so long.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

9. I'm afraid your "surely" is not true.

There are lots of things that one can find out about a chemical without live testing, but ultimately you're going to kill more humans and save fewer lives if you use medicines that haven't been tested on animals on humans.

At present, animal testing of medicines is an unpleasant necessity to save human lives.

As new alternatives are developed, the extent to which that is true will continue to decrease (and the number of things that can be tested on fish rather than mice, mice rather than dogs, dogs rather than monkeys etc will continue to increase), as it has been decreasing, but, sadly we're a long way from it ceasing to be true altogether.

I don't know what "rescued" means here, but if - as it often is - it's a euphemism for "stolen from people trying to save human lives" then it's not something to celebrate.

[tavernier]

10. You bring up an interesting point.

I wonder though why it wouldn't be possible to treat the animals more respectfully during their testing time, allowing them fresh air and outdoor exercise and contact with their own species. These dogs looked healthy so obviously they were allowed some form of exercise. And surely they could set limits on how long each dog must endure his "job" before earning his freedom.

[Contrary1]

11. Not "stolen"

From Beagle Freedom Project's page:

"...Testing done on beagles in university and other research facilities includes medical/pharmaceutical, household products and cosmetics. When they are no longer wanted for research purposes, some labs attempt to find homes for adoptable, healthy beagles. Working directly with these labs, Beagle Freedom Project is able to remove and transport beagles to place them in loving homes. All rescues are done legally with the cooperation of the facility."

Also, they claim that 106,000 people die yearly from drugs tested safe on animals. I haven't checked further to determine if that is true or not.

For what it's worth, I was involved in human testing on a drug to treat cancer. It was a small study group with only about 40 of us participating. The goal was to determine a tolerable dosage level. The trial was to last 12 months. Within 3 months, nearly half had dropped out due to side effects. By the end there were only about a dozen of us left.

I developed severe bursitis in every major joint of my body, except the jaw area. I lasted the entire year, but the dose had to be lowered. It was a miserable year. The drug never made it to market.

I was able to relate how I felt to the researchers. I could have opted out at any time. These animals have no choice in the matter. It just makes me sad, that's all.

[MineralMan]

14. As the adopter of a beagle through this

Beagle Freedom Project effort, I can assure you that none of these animals were removed illegally from the labs. Instead careful negotiation and education are the tools used to convince labs that these animals should have a chance of a good life after being experimented on.

The Beagle Freedom Project is 100% legitimate, and is also involved in lobbying for rules regarding experimental animals. In Minnesota, a measure was just passed by our state legislature requiring all labs receiving state funds to make every effort to make animals available for adoption. Some labs do not like to do this, and would rather just kill the dogs. They don't want publicity. The BFP does not inform its foster or adoptee homes of the names of the labs or what the nature of the experimentation was.

We've had Sam for almost 5 months now. He's doing well, but still prefers women to men. Our guess is that the handlers in the lab where he was were men, so he has some bad associations with men. He's slowly getting over that, and is now happily sleeping on the couch with his head on my shoulder. He does tend to run away if approached by me if I'm holding something in my hands. We're working on that, too.

He's doing very well, and our vet says that he's in very good physical shape. "A near perfect Beagle" was how he put it.

The BFP tries to place all of these animals in homes that already have a dog, since the lab beagle learns best from another dog, and that appears to be true. It took a while, but now he's marking trees, barking at squirrels, and doing all of the things dogs do. Our other dog, Dude, absolutely adores children, and Sam is learning that, too. He's very docile and patient with handling, and lets kids pet him and do pretty much whatever without any objection and with a constantly wagging tail. In short, he's turning into a typical happy Snoopy dog.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

15. A day for...